Best Summer Ever
by k2323
Summary: AKA "Not Another Romance AU Fanfic!" ...Wait, that's precisely what this is, but you should read it anyway! Carl, his girlfriend Sophia, and his best friend Nick set out to have the best summer ever before they all go off to college. But Carl's life is about to change in ways he can not even begin to explain.
1. The Math Test

**A/N: **Okay, so a few quick notes. First off, I usually **hate** stories like this. I usually hate stories where the characters have been aged and I usually hate AU stories but this story incorporates both of these clever, story-telling techniques. I had a sudden fit of inspiration, and as all writers know, in times like these, the stories write us – not the other way around. That being said, I encourage you to read this story and tell me how I did.

The story is based loosely on TheEightFoldPath's 93 Days Of Summer, which ironically I think is probably based on my story, 239 Days. If you have not yet read either of these two stories, by all means, check out my profile. You'll find TheEightFoldPath's story under my Favorite Stories tab. But as I said, this story is only loosely based on either of those two. I needed a bit of a break from 239 Days. So, here's my latest:

**Best Summer Ever**

**Chapter One: The Math Test**

Carl's life had changed forever in 2010.

He almost lost his dad.

Rick was a Sheriff's Deputy at the time. He'd gotten shot trying to apprehend some dangerous criminals, and he wound up in the hospital in a coma as a result. Carl had only been twelve at the time. Before his dad's accident, the most pressing things on his mind had been how to survive middle school and how to get the new girl, Sophia, to notice him. The accident had changed his perspective on life, made him come to terms with reality, with growing up.

His dad had survived, don't get me wrong. He woke from his coma a few weeks later, and Carl was at his dad's bed side when that moment came. But from that day on, Carl knew that he couldn't be a kid anymore. He had to start taking life more seriously. He had to be... More like his dad.

"People are going to die in your life, son," Rick had told Carl, "And part of growing up is accepting that. Someday, hopefully years away from now, I'm going to die. Your mother's going to die. Death is a part of life. But we can't let that scare us. We can't let that stop us. Otherwise, we are nothing. Otherwise, we're just standing still."

And that was the most interesting part of Carl's seventh grade year.

That was five years ago. Our story doesn't start in the past. It starts here:

**May 15th, 2015.**

**King County High School.**

**10:16 A.M.**

Carl loved Nick like a brother, but really. That boy could talk. And talk. And talk.

"I'm just saying," Nick prattled on as he shoved a bite of pizza into his mouth, "Thar irn't ner surns-"

"Nick," Carl protested, "Don't speak with your mouth full, man."

"Erkay, murm," he replied, finishing his bite of pizza. "What I was saying is, there's no real sense in making us go to school for half a day. We just shouldn't have school at all. I mean, by the time we get up here and -"

He kept prattling on, but Carl's attention was elsewhere, as he held hands with his girlfriend of two years, Sophia. The three of them walked from the cafeteria towards Building 2, enjoying the warming, morning Georgia sun, the smell of freedom in the air. One more exam, and they were free. One more summer, and they would be beginning the most awesome summer of their lives... And the last summer before they'd all be leaving to start college.

"Are you ready?" Sophia quietly asked Carl as Nick continued his rant behind them.

"Better be," Carl replied, smiling, "I studied all night."

"Who would have thought that the last thing between us and our diplomas would be Mrs. Mueller's math final?" noted Sophia.

"I liked her better when she was my third grade teacher and the hardest assignment was multiplying three times three," Carl complained.

The group took pause outside Building 2 as Nick finished his rant.

"...And **that** is why our education system needs **serious** reform!"

"Totally," Carl agreed half-heatedly. His eyes roamed the campus he'd come to appreciate so much over the last four years. This was finally it. The last day of high school.

"Well," Carl finally said, his hand on the door handle to Building 2. "This is it."

"The last day of high school!" Nick noted excitedly.

"I'm a little scared, to be honest," Sophia admitted.

"I'm not," Nick replied, laughing. "Because no more high school means college, and college means parties, and parties mean... college girls! And college girls mean-"

"We get it, Nick," Carl interrupted his friend, chuckling as he opened the glass doors to Building 2. Holding the door open for his girlfriend, he gave her his best country boy smile and said, "The future awaits, m'lady."

"What a gentleman," she replied with a similarly appropriate tone, mimicking the motions of a courtesy as she entered the building, Nick following behind.

**10:30 A.M.**

"Allow me to take this chance to tell you all how much I am going to miss you," Judith Mueller admitted to her class. "Over the last number of years, I have watched many of you grow up. I have met many new faces along the way, and it has been an honor to be a part of your youth. Believe me when I say that you are all a great group of young men and women, and I wish you the best of luck in all your future endeavors."

A string of compliments everywhere from 'Thank you' to 'We'll miss you, Mrs. Mueller!' were returned, but Judith only smiled as she noted, "I'm flattered, really. But you still have to take the test."

The class groaned as she began handing out the papers.

"As per usual," she noted, "You may have your calculators out, and you are required to show any spare work on the paper provided for you. If you need more, raise your hand and I will provide it for you. Always try. Don't leave a question blank. I can at least give you partial credit if I see you were on the right track."

Carl waited nervously at his desk. This test was of the utmost importance.

Carl's dad had agreed to pay for Carl's ticket on the senior cruise... Only if Carl had an A-B average. No C's. Math was the hardest subject for Carl, and he'd barely been able to maintain the low B he had most of the semester. This final was going to determine rather or not Carl would spend the next two weeks on a cruise or on a couch. Carl was sweating profusely as he grabbed his sheet from the person in the desk in front of him.

Scribbling his name onto the paper, Carl's eyes darted to the first section. Trig. Easy.

He typed a series of sequences onto his calculator. Sin 90 Degrees. Cosine. Find the missing angle. Find the missing side. Find...

Uh-oh.

Question #5. A word problem. Given the drawing and the information below, find the height of the tree.

Below the problem was a drawing of a tree, rooted to the ground, with a ladder at a diagonal angle against the tree. Carl... Had no idea what to do. Think. Come on. Think. Think.

Then, he remembered something that had happened earlier this year. Shane, Carl's step-dad, had taken Carl camping. Carl had been looking forward to it all year, but unfortunately, he had a big math test on Monday. Lori had made a deal with Carl and Shane. They could go, but... Carl had to study while they were on the camping trip.

"_I don't see why I have to actually study," Carl had complained, "We **could** just tell mom I studied and I can put this book down and we can go fishing."_

"_No can do," Shane replied, "Because then, you'll fail your math test, and **I'll** be in the dog house."_

"_Fine," Carl grudgingly replied._

_They were silent for a few moments as Carl racked his brain over a math problem, and then Carl, frustrated, through his pencil to the ground._

"_It's no fucking use!"_

"_Hey, man. Watch your language!" Shane interjected._

"_I'll never understand any of this! It's not like I'm ever going to use any of it anyway!"_

"_Let me see that math book," Shane replied, grabbing a hold of it, "Maybe I can help."_

"_You...? Math?" Carl replied._

"_Hey, I'll have you know, I was quite the excellent math student in high school. Which problem are you stuck on?"_

"_That one," Carl replied, pointing to a word problem._

_Shane studied the problem closely. An eleven foot ladder leans up against a tree, forming a 30 Degree Angle. The base of the ladder is a distance of two feet away from the base of the tree. Find the height, in feet, of the tree._

"_Well, damn, son, this one's easy," Shane protested._

"_What's the answer?" Carl asked, hopefully._

"_Not so fast, now. You're going to have to come up with that one on your own."_

"_Knew it," Carl replied, frowning in frustration._

"_Tell you what," Shane replied, "Go get the ladder off the top of the RV and bring it down here."_

"_What?" Carl asked, surprised._

_Slower, Shane repeated himself, "Go get the ladder... And bring it down here."_

"_Okay," Carl replied, trotting off towards the RV. A few minutes later, he returned, carrying a large ladder._

"_Good," Shane replied, looking around the camp site, "Now... Go lean it up against that tree."_

_Carl carried the ladder over to the tree that Shane had pointed out and leaned the ladder against it. Shane walked up to him, studying the set up closely._

"_Now, for the sake of conversation, let's say that this ladder is eleven feet tall."_

"_Shane, it's obviously a lot taller than -"_

"_For the sake of conversation. Okay, and let's say that the ladder is, what was it?"_

"_30 Degrees," Carl replied._

"_Right. The ladder and the tree form a 30 Degree Angle. And the bottom of the ladder, here," Shane motioned towards the base of the ladder, "Is two feet away from the base of the tree, here," Shane pointed out the base of the tree. "Now what kind of angle does this whole... set up form?"_

"_A 30 degree angle," Carl replied, sarcastically._

"_No, look. If the point where the top of the ladder meets the tree is your B angle and it's 30 Degrees, what angle is formed down here, where the ground meets the tree?"_

"_...What?" Carl asked._

_Shane sighed. He started to draw a straight line with his foot from the base of the ladder to the base of the tree._

"_Look closely," Shane said again._

"_...Oh! A right angle!"_

"_Theeere you go, man!" Shane nodded in agreement. "Now hurry up and finish your math homework so we can go fishing."_

...Well, duh.

Once Carl realized how simple the word problem was, he quickly arrived at the answer and wrote it down on his paper, moving on to the next question. Before he knew it, he had finished the test, the bell had rang, and Carl was the last one in the class room, waiting patiently beside Mrs. Mueller's desk as she, after much convincing, graded Carl's test early. Carl could hear the ticking of the clock on the wall, and a building excitement for the summer that was about to start was rising in his stomach, but being slapped back down by the dread of the possibility that he could be walking out of this class with a C average. Every red pen stroke on his paper, every tick of the clock, the sound of Mrs. Mueller gently humming as she graded Carl's paper... He felt like he might explode with terror and excitement and impatience.

And then, Mrs. Mueller looked up from her paper.

"Welllll?" Carl questioned.

He needed at least an 84 on this test.

"Ninety two," she replied, a smile on her face as the boy whom she had taught all these years erupted into cheers and whoops and hollers. Carl gave Mrs. Mueller a huge bear hug.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" Carl kept saying as he proceeded to moon dance out of the class room.

Carl was finished with high school.

And now, it was time to celebrate.


	2. Parents

**Chapter 2:**

**Parents**

Carl's day only got better.

He took Sophia home to the trailer that she shared with her mom. He stopped on the way home at a gas station to fill up the Ford F150 that Shane had bought Carl last year for his birthday. Then, he stopped at the Walgreens to return the Redbox movie the family had watched last night and to pick up tonight's movie. Finally, he headed home.

Once upon a time, Shane would have never been able to afford the nice house that the family lived in. He'd been a Sheriff's Deputy and had made a modest living, but after Shane and Lori got married, he'd worked his way up in Corrections and now proudly held the title of Chief Warden at the King County Prison, a much better paying job by far. And it was this job that had bought the nice house in the "good part of town", the nice vehicles, the nice life that Carl had been afforded.

Pulling into the driveway of the two-story home where he resided, Carl noticed Shane was home from work early, outside, hosing down the RV. Shane had bought it a few years back from some old man who had taken it on a trip all around the country, all by himself. Despite all the miles on this RV, it still ran like a charm, and had provided many great memories for Carl and Shane. It had allowed them to bond in a way Carl hadn't been able to do with his own father.

"What's with the RV?" Carl asked as he stepped out of his truck, joining Shane by the RV.

"Oh, I thought we'd take her out this weekend, head up into the mountains for a little weekend get away. You, me, your mom... Sophia, too, if you'd like. I figure it's the least we can do to celebrate this moment in your life... That is... If you're up for it."

A grin spread across Carl's face. "Hell yes I am!"

"Good!" Shane replied, "Now go help your mom with dinner. I'll be in in a bit."

Carl started towards the front door of the house when he heard a horn honk. He turned his head to the street where he noticed the familiar sight of a Squad Car pulling up, parking on the street. The window of the Squad Car rolled down to reveal Rick Grimes in the driver's seat. Carl shot Shane a glance, then looked back at his father. Those two didn't talk much, and for good reason.

Carl lightly jogged across the yard to his father's car. Crouching, he peered into the window and across to the driver's seat where his father sat.

"Dad," Carl greeted his father, "I didn't know you were coming."

"Yeah," Rick nodded, "Yeah, I would have called, but..."

There was always a sort of awkward silence between the two, every time they talked. Rick... just... wasn't good at expressing what he was feeling. He tended to keep everything bottled up inside. There was a time, after the accident, when that had started to change. Rick had started to open up, started to express himself... Until his wife left him for his best friend. Rick's relationship with his son had never quite been the same since then.

"Do you want to come in? I'm sure mom wouldn't mind. She's cooking... um... On second thought, you probably don't want to come in. Mom's cooking."

Rick chuckled. "I just wanted to come by and tell you how proud I am."

"Oh," Carl replied, nodding, "Thanks."

Rick's eyes shifted to the road ahead, glaring off at some unseen sight in the distance, trying to avoid eye contact, to avoid showing too much emotion.

"If you're not doing anything, I was thinking we could go grab some dinner, maybe catch a movie," Rick proposed.

"Um," Carl paused. His mother was cooking dinner, but on the other hand... His mother was cooking for dinner.

"Okay, I guess that sounds cool," Carl agreed, "Let me go tell Shane."

Rick watched as his son jogged across the yard to Shane. Shane. Rick's former best friend, the man who had been like a brother to him, who had stabbed him in the back and stolen his wife and son from him. Shane. Rick could barely stand looking at him. He watched as Shane looked up at Rick, processing Carl's request, and then watched him nod as Carl ran back towards the squad car. Opening the door, Carl got in and proceeded to buckle his seat belt.

"So, dinner. What did you have in mind?" Carl asked his dad.

…

**Community Groves Trailer Park**

**May 16th**

**9 A.M.**

"I mean it, Sophia!" Carol insisted as her angry teenage daughter stormed across the room towards her bedroom.

"Mom, I'm **eighteen!** You've given me this talk a million times! Carl and I are waiting till marriage! Nothing's going to happen! You're being ridiculous!"

"I'm being realistic!" Carol responded, "I know what it's like to be eighteen!"

Sophia slammed the door to her bedroom. Carol stopped outside the door, waiting.

"Great!" Sophia yelled back, "I'm **so glad** to know that my **own mother** doesn't trust me!"

"I do trust you, honey," Carol replied, "But Carl's a teenage boy. And teenage boys only have one thing on their mind."

"So you don't trust Carl? The same Carl who's come over for dinner, like, a million times? The same Carl who's mom is like, your best friend?"

"I trust Carl," Carol replied, "I don't trust his hormones. Or _yours_, for that matter."

Sophia opened the door and glared at her mother.

"Mom. Sooner or later, you're going to have to stop looking at me like I'm the same, fragile little girl who needed your protection, and start looking at me like an adult."

Carol sighed. "I know. I just wish you wouldn't be in such a hurry to grow up. Everything's changing and this isn't easy on either of us."

"That's how life works, mom," Sophia replied. "Things change. I've changed. You've changed, too. We're both strong, independent women. And we can both take care of ourselves."

Carol smiled lightly. "When did my little girl grow up to be such a wise young lady?"

She wrapped her daughter in a hug.

"Mom," Sophia protested, "You're suffocating me."

Carol released her daughter from the hug and gave her a studious look.

"Fine."

"What?" Sophia replied.

"Fine."

"I can go?"

"You can go," Carol replied as Sophia started to cheer ecstatically, "**But**, you better make sure this room is clean before you go, young lady! And I'm going to tell Lori to keep an eye on you two! And that boy better be sleeping on the couch! And-"

"Thank you, mom," Sophia replied happily, "I love you."

"I love you, too, baby girl," Carol replied, "I love you, too."


End file.
